Sutton Harbour

We left Dartmouth at first light - about 4.30am- to catch the tail end of the tide. We had a good sail in moderate winds down to Start Point. After that the trip followed a pattern that is becoming familiar on this cruise - fog, rain and head winds. Usually we seem to have been experiencing one of these at any one time and often more. Eventually we got to Plymouth Sound which is all pleasantly familiar as I kept a boat here for a year.

The SW Old Gaffers had arranged for us to berth in Sutton Harbour which is in the most picturesque part of town. Bonita berthed alongside our old friends Dave and Julie in Susan J. Many of the assembled Gaffers were dressed overall with flags proving a fine spectacle.

We all assembled for supper later. Everyone is naturally a bit anxious about the weather for crossing the Bristol Channel but that is still a few days away. There was good food, drink, conversation and musical entertainment. But a little of this goes quite a long way after a 4am start.

New Crew!

Bonita was in Dartmouth all day today drying out a bit from yesterday. Sadly Justin has now run out of time having helped us all the way from the Swale, and has had to return to the real world. My new crew is Geoff who arrived this afternoon after a rather tortuous journey from Canterbury.

The most pressing job that needed doing was making a new boom crutch to replace the one that got washed over yesterday.

The picture shows the final product. The previous one was in oak with a patina accumulated over many years of varnishing. The new one is in knotty pine as that's all they had in the shop. However it should do OK until I can either make a more sophisticated one or maybe just get used to it.

We had a jolly supper in the yacht club with Martin Pound, sailing a shrimper, Charlotte Elizabeth singlehanded. 

A stormy day

We left Dartmouth with a forecast of moderate SW winds, with Justin as crew. There was thick fog past Start Point, but with a bit of care and watching the GPS and AIS that's not too concerning as there is very little traffic in these waters apart from fishing boats which usually seem to carry AIS. We were sailing along fine with a fair tide, and expecting to be in Plymouth by mid afternoon. Then there was a tremendous squall from SW with driving rain, and very quickly a heavy swell sprung up. One advantage of sailing a gaffer is that it's very easy to drop the mainsail - the weight of the gaff brings it down whereas Bermudan mainsail can be difficult to get down in bad weather. When the squall hit us we dropped the main completely and rolled up the jib so we were roaring along with just staysail and mizzen. This strong wind wasn't forecast. I thought it was at least force 8 ( gale force). It was obviously quite widespread. Of the Gaffers, Indian Runner a few miles from us recorded a strength of 35 knots and had to turn back,  and Dave Patuck on Susan J off Plymouth recorded gusts of 60 knots. In Lyme Bay the pilot cutter Lettie suffered rigging damage due to the strength of the wind and had to put back for repairs.Pilot cutters are pretty solid and robust craft

I thought it might be a passing squall so we carried on under staysail and mizzen for a bit, getting very wet in the process due to clouds of spray coming over the boat. But after about half an hour we decided that we couldn't go on so we had better go back. So we ran back to Dartmouth and tied up to the pontoon we had left that morning. I had thought of going into Salcombe, which was nearer, but it was near low tide, and there is a bar at the entrance to Salcombe Harbour which can be dangerous in heavy onshore winds.

Bonita seems to have stood up to this poor treatment quite well. Sadly the mainsail boom crutch - which had been tied on- disappeared overboard at some point. A pity, as it was nicely made of oak with brass hinges. We need to stay in Dartmouth tomorrow for a crew change so I will try to make a replacement boom crutch.

Of the Gaffers in Dartmouth, Swift and Step Back in Time were sensible enough to stay here all day. Charlotte Elizabeth, Hilda and Bonita have put in due to stress of weather.

The Gaffers gathering in Plymouth tomorrow may have fewer boats attending than they expected, though we hope to get there some time on Thursday.

Lyme Bay and Dartmouth

We left Studland Bay at midnight to get the tide and had a reasonably quick journey so far as a point 3 miles off Portland Bill.

It was a clear moonlit night, as as the sun rose over the horizon we saw a rainbow high in the western sky.

After the excitement of passing Portand Bill, the long trek across the fifty miles or so of Lyme Bay can be a bit of an ordeal. We had strong SSW winds and at one point had to take in several reefs. There were clouds of spray and solid water over the boat and plenty of damp below. Then we had thick fog with visibility at times probably less than two hundred yards. In very poor visibility we cautiously approached the rocky entrance to Dartmouth. Even with GPS this sort of thing is difficult: without GPS it would virtually impossible.

We found 2 boats from The OGA Round Britain fleet already here - Swift and Step Back in Time.

Studland Bay

This morning started misty with very little wind. Sadly D had to work and went back home on the train, or rather the Sunday version the 'rail replacement bus'. Justin and I left Cowes on Bonita at about 7.30am. There was little sign of life among the Gaffers at that time. By the time the west-going tide started, about midday, we were off Yarmouth, and a moderate head wind sprung up. We are keen to get to Plymouth in time for the next gaffer gathering if possible, but its tedious trying to make progress against head winds and spring tides. The tide was almost spent by the time we got to the Dorset coast so we stopped in Studland Bay near the Old Harry rocks.

Rather than anchoring here as we have in the past, we tied up to an ecologically friendly buoy.

The sea bed here is rich in sea grass, but this is a popular anchorage and the anchors disturb the grass. Rather than anchoring we are encouraged to tie up to an eco-mooring. I think it's much the same as any other mooring really but only disturbs the sea bed once when it gets installed. 

SW winds are forecast for the next few days but we hope there may be an opportunity to move further west before too long.